The Morning After
by Metal Gear Prime
Summary: Chapter 4! Dinobot falls afoul of a bored Rattrap, Blackarachnia learns something new, Inferno is puzzled and an old foe returns. Exciting or what?
1. Gotta lay off the vodka

The Morning After 

By Metal Gear Prime

Summary: A night of heavy drinking leads to a slightly awkward morning after for Airrazor and Blackarrachnia…

Couples: Airazor/Blackarachnia with a healthy dose of Megatron/Inferno (as inspired by Albedo ^_^)

Timeline: Near the end of Season 1.

Author's note: I'd like to think I'm the first person to pair up Airrazor and Blackarrachnia, but I won't because I just know that someone is bound to give me the address of a website packed to the rafters with just that sort of material (not that such information wouldn't be welcome mind you  ^_^) Instead, I would like to think that the Beast Warriors wearing helmets are hiding some hair underneath them (a view nurtured by Blackarachnia's long, flowing locks in Beast Machines) And so, after that tidbit of essential information, on to the fic!

Chapter 1: Gotta lay off the vodka…

The first thing Airazor noticed that bright Tuesday morning was how dark it was. An almost endless shroud of darkness, an unholy black hole of incredible magnitude covering her from the light.

Then she realized that she merely had her optics closed.

As she attempted to open them, (a simple task made unbelievably difficult by the fact that her lids had suddenly seemed to be nine times heavier than normal), she found that a gap existed in her memory. For some reason, she couldn't remember what had happened last night.

Alarmed, her optics flung open. She knew what this memory block was. It was the fabled 'morning amnesia', a condition that afflicted all sentient species and possibly a few non-sentient ones as well. Airazor had woken up with this condition quite a few times before; it would always give her a few seconds of happy ignorance before assaulting her with whatever mishap had befallen her the previous night.

Well, not this time she decided. This time she would get today's horrible aftermath over with right now. With this in mind she sat up in the recharge bed and jumped slightly as her white hair tumbled over her eyes. As a rule, Airazor would almost immediately forget to remove her helmet every night, resulting in a pounding headache the next morning. Today, the helmet headache was gone and replaced by a delightfully horrific hangover.

Hangover. So, she had been drinking then. Heavily, judging by the jackhammer contest taking place in her skull right now.

As she put a hand to her head, a glance downwards revealed a much more worrying problem.

She was naked.

Buck naked.

As she gazed around the room for her armor Airazor noticed something that magnified her naked problem to an 'oh slag' level.

This wasn't her room.

Worse, the Predacon symbol above the door meant that this wasn't even her _base_.

Emitting a slight yelp, Airazor drew the covers up as her mind feverishly ran through a number of options to escape the Darkside. Suddenly, a previously unnoticed bundle lying next to her began to move, which immediately brought the entire of last night into sharp focus for the falcon. Her optics bulged comically as she remembered exactly what happened last night.

"Oh slag", she breathed as her denial circuitry went into overdrive. "Oh slag, that did not happen. Please Primus let that not have happened."

On cue, the bundle next to her sleepily poked its head out from underneath the covers. A gold femmebot head, minus her helmet and sleepily regarding Airrazor with her green optics through a curtain of long black hair. Sleepy green optics swiftly became alarmed green optics as Blackarachnia fully woke up. As she sat up in bed Airrazor couldn't help but notice that the spider was in a similar state of undress.

A long, exquisite silence passed.

A silence broken by Airazor, who said the only coherent thing that would come to mind.

"Um…good morning?"

To be continued… 


	2. Dealing with the situation

Chapter 2: Dealing with the situation  

Although she was sure that there would be worse ones to come, Blackarachnia decided that today had to rank as possibly the worst morning of her life, not to mention the most embarrassing. Finding the Maximal Airazor in her bed had been, to use a massive understatement, something of a shock, their mutual state of undress even more so. Not surprisingly, the spider's first question that morning had been something along the lines of:

"Pray tell, whither brings you to my bed sans clothing?"

Only the version that passed Blackarachnia's lips was more profane and at a much higher pitch.

After that both femmebots busied themselves with dressing themselves, resolutely avoiding looking each other in the face. As Blackarachnia snapped her breastplate back into position she gazed around her quarters and just barely managed to keep from gawping as she spied a number of sexual paraphernalia lying haphazardly around the room. A whip, handcuffs, nineteen cans of whipped cream (all empty), a plastic dolphin with battery powered fins and an extra long snout that Blackarachnia recognized as Waspinator's and a bucket of soapy frogs.

Blackarachnia's eyes widened comically as she put on her helmet without scooping her long ebony hair up while staring at this last item. _Soapy frogs?!?_

"Uh…Blackarachnia?" Airazor spoke up, causing the black widow to spin around to face her.

"Didn't I just tell you not to speak?" Blackarachnia said, her voice not carrying the annoyance she was feeling.

"Yeah, but…"

"But nothing!" 

Annoyance now in full bloom, Blackarachnia walked over to the window and pressed a button on the control panel. Instantly the glass retracted into the frame, letting in the crisp morning air.

"Well, off you go."

Airazor blinked in surprise. "You're just going to let me go?"

The thought of taking Airazor prisoner had crossed Blackarachnia's mind and had been dumped with lightning speed, the chief reason being that there was a chance, however slight, that one of her fellow Predacons would find out just how she had managed to capture the falcon. She cared little for their opinions about her but she didn't intend to spend the rest of eternity putting up with their puerile innuendo either.  

Looking at Airazor once again, Blackarachnia was momentarily struck by how…cute she looked, her shoulder length white hair framing her face in an almost angelic manner. Mentally shaking herself, she noticed something else.

"Look, just put on your helmet and fly back to your base would you?"

"That's what I was trying to ask you for."

"Huh?"

"You're wearing it."

Turning to a wall mounted mirror Blackarachnia saw that she had accidentally put Airazor's helmet on by mistake. Taking it off she tossed it at the falcon, who slipped it on quickly.

"Now get the slag out of here. And if you breathe a word of this to anyone I swear – "

Airazor looked at the black widow as if she had just suggested a repeat of last night's show. "Are you loopy? As if I'd WANT this broadcasted to my friends!"

With that, Airazor converted to Beast Mode and flew out of the Darkside, leaving the seething Blackarachnia behind her.

*****

As Airazor flew towards the Axalon, her mind refusing to give up the image of that moment in Blackarachnia's quarters (not to mention the six hours spent there last night), she became aware of Gilgamesh One below her. Perching on the roof of the very bar she and Blackarachnia had accidentally met up, Airazor cursed the city's existence for the first time.

Gilgamesh One was founded by a group of people who were apparently born without an ability to understand a situation. Airazor had been there, alongside Optimus, Rattrap and Rhinox to meet the settlers the day their massive fleet of ships had arrived via a transwarp portal and immediately began to build the city. She had watched as Optimus tried in vain to explain the fact that there was a war going on to the settler's leader, who countered this argument with the fact that the ground was ultra-cheap and therefore a prime bit of real estate to snap up. It was all somewhat irrelevant anyway, seeing as how half of the city was built and open for business already in what has been now recognized as the hardest day's work ever. Optimus had been fairly angry that day, mostly because Airazor, Rattrap and Rhinox had deserted him to try out Gilgamesh One's brand new Casino. He had left predicting that it would bring about changes in the Beast Wars. 

Of course, he was right, but possibly not in the sense he had expected. A few days after Gilgamesh One's grand opening, the Beast Wars had, to be blunt, stalled. This was thanks solely to the almost unholy number of attractions and shops that littered the streets of what was one of the biggest cities ever built. Various members of each faction would go missing on the day of a battle and be found later in the city, trying out the cinemas, the fine restaurants or the many, many bars. 

Blocking the image that the word 'bar' induced, Airazor took to the skies and resumed her slight to the Axalon.

*****

Back on the Darkside it was a case of so far so good for Blackarachnia. It was times like these that she was glad that all of the Darkside's living quarters were sound proofed, given the amount of noise she and Airazor made last night.

Angrily she punched a bulkhead with her claw. That damned drunken night…

It wasn't the humiliation that made her so angry, nor was it the fact that she had let her defenses down so easily.

No, the most galling thing about this whole sordid affair was the fact that she had enjoyed the experience. Every single second of it. And to Blackarachnia, who had never considered herself, to put it crudely, as a player for the 'other team', it was a matter which was causing any manner of confusion.

As she walked, the spider was dimly aware of Terrorsaur and Waspinator talking to each other at the end of the adjacent corridor. A question from Terrorsaur brought her attention around.

"So, what did ya think of last's night show?"

Stopped in her tracks, Blackarachnia listened in on the discussion.

"Wazzzzpinator liked it!" the wasp replied, sipping his mug of energon. "Not know bodies could bend that far."

Blackarachnia stiffened slightly. They couldn't have…

"Yeah", Terrorsaur chuckled lewdly. "Ya know what the best part was? When Blackarachnia beast-moded and…"

The pterodactyl was cut off in his reminisces by the sound of rapidly approaching footsteps. Turning around, he and Waspinator watched a very pissed off Blackarachnia stalk towards them, claws twitching and eyes a deep red. All at once Terrorsaur felt a surge of horror even greater than the time Megatron survived his assassination attempt and meted out some retribution. Waspinator, his survival instincts honed to an extremely high degree by years of bodily harm, immediately shifted to a happy demeanor in the desperate hope that the spider hadn't heard their conversation.

"Oh! How is spider-bot this morn – URK!"

With a deceptively sweet smile Blackarachnia grabbed Waspinator and Terrorsaur by the throats and lifted them off the ground.

"Hello, boys", she said before her voice took on a more sinister tone. "Let's have a chat."

To be continued…


	3. The night before

Chapter 3: The night before 

The Fate Bar, Tuesday 11:30 p.m….

It was a slow night for Gilgamesh One's biggest bar, Airazor noted. Only three people had to be flung out by the six eyed, nine foot tall reptilian bartender (whose race Airazor couldn't quite place) and for once, all patrons had (so far) upheld the rule of no weapons usage. In fact, it had been quite a peaceful night until…

"Well, look who's here!"

The falcon swiveled to her left and found herself face to face with Blackarachnia. There was a large frothy drink in her claw and a smirk on her face, the latter of which never even sagged as Airazor aimed her pistol at the black widow.

"Hey hey hey!" the bar tender yelled. "Can't ya read?" He extended a claw toward a hanging sign bearing the legend "No guns/explosives/melee weapons allowed".

Airazor turned from the bar tender to Blackarachnia, who spread her arms out in a (mocking?) gesture of peace. The Maximal reluctantly put her pistol back into its subspace compartment.

"What're you doing here anyway?" she asked the spider, as she sat at Airazor's table.

"What?" Blackarachnia replied in an exaggerated show of innocence. "A girl can't enjoy a drink in this fine establishment?"

"No, I meant what are you doing at…what in the Pit is that thing anyway?" said Airazor, pointing to the extremely volatile drink Blackarachnia had laid on the table.

"This?" Blackarachnia held the drink up. "It's a Pan-Galactic Gargle Blaster."

"A Pan-Galactic Gargle Blaster?" Airazor's optics widened. "That drink's been banned in twenty galaxies!"

"Twenty-five, actually. Grank'spuk over there just happens to be a whiz at making these."

Airazor followed Blackarachnia's claw to the bartender. She stared for a few seconds before the Predacon's voice, high with mockery and sarcasm, filtered through her audio sensors.

"Anyway, just thought I'd say hi before enjoying my drink. I'll leave you to your…cola."

Airazor bristled at Blackarachnia's sarcastic delivery of 'cola'. "Hey! I could drink a PGGB if I wanted! I'm just…not in the mood."

"Of course you could, honey", Blackarachnia smirked as she started to walk off.

The black widow didn't really expect the next sentence to come out of the falcon's mouth.

"Hey barkeep! Gimmie a Pan-Galactic Gargle Blaster! And make it a DOUBLE!"

A great gasp reverberated around the room. As Grank'spuk nervously began to prepare the drink, Blackarachnia sat back down, intrigued.

"A double? Are you mad?"

Airazor looked Blackarachnia in the optics as the barkeep delivered the drink. Ignoring the fact that the Double PGGB was shuddering violently, she answered the spider.

"You make as if you're such a hotshot drinker. Prove it."

"You're challenging me to a drinking contest?"

"Yep", Airazor replied, silently wondering what the slag she was doing.

A smile crossed over Blackarachnia's face. "All right then, you're on. Barkeep! I'll have what's she's having!" 

Shaking his head, Grank'spuk whipped up another Double PGGB and delivered it to the Transformers' table, taking back the original PGGB he had given the spider. Ready now, the duo raised their glasses and donwed them in one go.

It should be noted that Pan-Galactic Gargle Blasters have such a high alcohol content that most people can get drunk simply by looking at one. So you can imagine what a ingesting a Double PGGB would do.

The bar patrons watched as both Transformers teetered slightly after putting down their drinks. After a moment of silence, the spider twisted in her seat to speak to Grank'spuk and nearly fell out of it.

"Hey! Hey…hic!…Barkeep. K-keep 'em comin'."

Three hours later… 

"S-so thatsh's when I decided to tell that grape-faced git what was on my mind!" Blackarachnia banged her glass on the table for emphasis, upsetting the ten empty ones nearby.

"Uh-huh", Airazor muttered, gazing at Blackarachnia and the three duplicates that had suddenly sprung up out of nowhere.

"Yeah", the spider slurred, trying to take a swig from her glass. Realizing that it was empty, she banged it down again. "So!" she said fiercely. "What do you think I did then?"

"Dunno."

"You don't?" Confusion and disappointment spread across the spider's face. "Pity. I was hoping someone knew."

Silence reigned for a few moments as both femmes tried to marshal their alcohol sodden thoughts. Suddenly Airazor broke into hysterical sobbing.

"Oh Primus, I'm so lonely!"

Blackarachnia stared at the falcon for a second before clumsily patting her on the back. "There…hic!… there."

"I mean, I'm thirty thousand years old!" Airazor bawled. "Do you know how many relationships I've had? Have a guess."

"Three?"

"Wrong! I've only had three. Three relationships in thirty thousand years! That's only…umm…well, it's not very many!"

"I wouldn't worry about it", Blackarachnia replied, trying to siphon the last remains of liquor from her glass. "You're bound to find someone eventually."

"Really?"

"Oh yeah! You're smart, funny and…uh, you turn into a bird. Who wouldn't want you?"

"Thanks buddy", Airazor smiled, reaching out to embrace Blackarachnia and missing her by three feet.

"Time please", Grank'spuk called out ringing a bell. Grumbling, the bar's patrons reluctantly finished their drinks and headed for the exit. It was with some dismay that Grank'spuk noticed that the two Cybertronians were still in their seats.

"Erm…ladies? Closing time."

"We know", Blackarachnia nodded. "Can we have another PGGB?"

"Uh, no you can't. You have to leave now."

 Grank'spuk watched as Airazor tried to glare at him with unfocused optics from her position on the floor. "And if we say no?"

The barkeep let out a world-weary sigh as he pressed a button on the underside of the bar. Both Airazor and Blackarachnia disappeared in a flash of light and reappeared instantaneously outside the bar, slightly confused and sitting on the ground.

"How rude", Blackarachnia muttered, picking herself up. "Damn teleporters."

"Eh, probably for the best. I have to get back to the Axel…Exal…that place where I live anyways. Airazor, MINIMIZE!"

There was a long silence as they both waited for Airazor to transform to her beast mode. Nothing happens.

"Hmm. Seems my transformation code isn't working. Looks like I'll have to walk."

"Are you crazy? The Fax Salon is tons of miles away, plus it's the dead of night."

A smile slowly spread across the spider's face as an idea formed in her head.

"Why don'tcha stay at the Darkside for the night?"

Airazor looks a little doubtful at the wisdom of this idea. Blackarachnia clumsily drapes her arm around the Maximal's shoulders as she tries to sell the idea.    

"C'mon, which would you prefer to do? Walk home in the dark or sleep over in a base full of homicidal maniacs?"

"Well…my feet are a bit sore…"

"Okay then! Let's go!"

Ten minutes later…

All things considered, Airazor was having a great time with Blackarachnia, singing rude songs involving Rodimus Prime, Galvatron and a pair of greased up Mecannibals as they walked towards the Darkside. She was having such a good time, in fact, that an extremely good question that should've popped into her brain much earlier didn't surface until a plasma bolt whizzed just past her ear.

"Hey", she yelled as another bolt impacted at her feet. "How am I supposed to get past the auto-guns?"

"Hmmm?" Blackarachnia replied as Airazor ducked yet another blast. "Oh, those? Relax, I've got it under control."

Reaching into subspace, Blackarachnia pulled out a small remote control, pointed at the Darkside and pressed a button. Instantly the auto-guns retracted into their alcoves. Ariazor looks on, slightly bemused.

"What – URP! – happened?"

"I turned the guns off with my remote control."

"You have a remote control for your auto-guns?"

"We all do. Someone keeps programming the auto-guns to fire on Predacons as well as Maximals. Mind you, they only ever seems to target me, grape face and his whipping ant…

"Whipping ant?"

"Trust me, you don't wanna know. Anyways, we all got issued these remote controls in case it happened again."

"Oh. Cool."

"Isn't it just?"

And with that the duo entered the Darkside. After clumsily navigating their way through the ship (and at one stage accidentally entering Waspinator's quarters. Luckily, he wasn't there at the time) the duo finally arrived at Blackarachnia's quarters.

"You can bunk with me tonight, seeing as how I've misplaced the guest quarters."

"You sure that's okay?" Airazor asked.

"Sure!" Blackarachnia nodded. "Anything for my bestest buddy!"

Still nodding, Blackarachnia keyed in her access code, upon which the door swished open. Stumbling inside, Airazor took a token stock of the number of posters showing punk rock bands that adorned the spider's walls. She had more important things on her mind at the moment.

"I think there's a spare recharge bed in my closet" Blackarachnia called as she locked the door. "Just pull it out and –"

The spider is interrupted by Airazor's head falling on her shoulder and her hands gently falling on her chest. Stunned, it's a few seconds before she can speak.

"Um…Airazor?"

"Yeah?"

"What are you doing?"

Frowning, Airazor turned the spider around so she could face her. 

"You don't like it?"

"Well…", Blackarachnia murmured, unsure on how to deal with this.

"It's just that…well, like I said, it's been a while since I've been…intimate with someone…"

Blackarachnia looked at Airazor in bemusement. "So you haven't slept with a guy for a few millennia. Why are you coming onto me?"

"Those three relationships I mentioned? They…ah…they weren't with guys."

"Oh?" Blackarachnia said. A second later her eyes widened with understanding.

"Ohhhhhhh."

"Mmm-hmm." Airazor nodded.

An awkward silence ensues.

"Soooo", Blackarachnia queried, her curiosity overwhelming her shock, "what's it like? You know, that whole…lifestyle."

Airazor blinked in surprise, then recovered admirably quickly, a smile playing on her lips. "Why don't you find out first hand?"

Blackarachnia considered this for a moment. On one hand, it would certainly be a…different experience than those she had had on Cybertron. On the other, there was what her teammates, not being the most open-minded of robots, would say if they found out about this. After all, the only reason they didn't openly taunt Megatron and Inferno was because none of them wanted to die a horrifically painful death. Still, how would they be able to find out about…

Any more analysis on the matter at hand was stalled by Airazor suddenly and passionately kissing Blackarachnia full on the lips. The shock that followed was immediately replaced by one simple thought.

Ah, what the hell? 

Returning the kiss in full, the duo fell onto Blackarachnia's bed…

To be continued…  


	4. Fun with anesthetics

Chapter 4: Fun with anesthetics 

"Hey! Are you listenin'?"

"Whuh?" Airazor muttered, the high-pitched tone of a certain rodent invading what had been a deep (and surprisingly pleasurable) trip down memory lane. Turning in her seat, the falcon met the gaze of a somewhat irritable Rattrap, while simultaneously looking at the wall mounted clock behind him. It was six in the evening.

"You aren't, are ya?" he accused.

"Well…"

"Dat's just typical! Every time someone's got a problem, da rat gotta listen to 'em, but when da rat's got a problem, every one heads for da hills!"

"That's not true…" Airazor offered half-heartedly, knowing full well that was the case.

"Oh? What about Polar Claw, eh? I ask him to help me with a few things, next thing I know he's off scouting da Antarctic! And don't get me started on Optimus…"

"Rattrap?"

"Yeh?"

"You ever think that maybe it's the fact that listening to your problems usually leads to the listener having to undergo something hideously dangerous and painful that everyone giving you a wide berth when you're in trouble?"

"What?!? Give me one example of dat!"

"Okay then," Airazor replied, searching her memory for a relevant example. She found it almost instantaneously. "Ah. Remember last week? The 'Gilgamesh Mafia' incident?"

Rattrap grimaced. "It wasn't dat bad…"

"Or so you told Optimus. Next day, what does he find on the Axalon's doorstep? Seven gorilla sized collectors wanting…how did they put it?…'payment from the tiny annoying one'.

Airazor paused a moment to watch Rattrap squirm in his seat before continuing.

"It's a good thing Rhinox and Grimlock were there at the time, otherwise things might've gotten even messier than they did."

"Yeah, yeah", Rattrap muttered. "I paid for it though, didn't I? Three months monitor duty and a permanent ban on gambling."

"Yeah", Airazor admitted. "Mind you, Optimus might reconsider the monitor duty so long as you stay out of trouble…"

The rest of the sentence trailed off as Airazor saw the half-guilty/half smirk expression on Rattrap's face. She knew that expression meant that the Maximal spy had been up to something mischievous. 

"Rattrap?"

"Hmm?"

Airazor took a deep breath. "What did you do?" Then, as the though came to her, "Where's Dinobot?"

Rattrap's expression swiftly changed to barely contained laughter at the sound of the raptor's name.

"Well," he started, stifling a giggle, "Ya know dat big jar of numbing agent dat Rhinox keeps in his lab?"

Airazor's optics widened in reply. 

"You didn't…"

"I did. Lessee, it's a delayed reaction formula, I gave it to him three hours ago, so that means he should be here in…", at this Rattrap looked down at his wrist mounted watch while holding up three fingers, "three…two…one…"

Almost on the 'e' of 'one', a very, _very_, angry scream rose through the ship.

"VERMIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIN!!!"

"Gotta go!" Rattrap cheerfully called as he transformed to beast mode and scampered off. Airazor watched him go as Dinobot stumbled into the room seconds later.

The falcon goggled.

Apparently, Rattrap had somehow administered the numbing agent to the ex-Predacon's legs, which were now wobbling all over the place. Airazor briefly marveled at the fact that Dinobot was able to remain standing, let alone move around.

"Where is he?"

Dinobot's question caused Airazor to look up at the warrior's face, which was now twisted in absolute fury. Both his rotor blade and segmented sword were drawn, ready to rend some rodent flesh.

"Guh?" Airazor murmured, trying desperately to burst out laughing.

"The vermin!" Dinobot snarled, coming dangerously close to toppling over. "I know he was here!"

"Um…well, you see…"

"GAH! Never mind! It will be more satisfying to track him down on my own!"

And with that, Dinobot left the room, his legs alternating from swinging from side to side and moving in a relatively normal fashion. 

Once she was sure that the raptor was a safe distance away, Airazor collapsed into a fit of helpless giggles.

*****

Inferno was confused.

Strangely, this was a rare occurrence for the relatively simple minded warrior, who usually went about his business with the sole purpose of serving his Queen.

Ironically, this was the source of his confusion.

Inferno sighed happily as he remembered the first time the Royalty had chosen him as her mate. Him! A lowly soldier ant, chosen by the Queen to help her propagate the Colony! Inferno had always though this thing could only happen in dreams or tawdry ant novels, and yet it had happened to him! It was if he had died and gone to the Matrix. 

Oddly, Inferno's fellow drones didn't seem to share his happiness. Their reactions ranged from Tarantulas and Fractyl doing their best to avoid him, Scorponok's optics going a curious shade of green and leaking what human would have called tears, and Insecticon running away screaming. Very strange, given that a sexually sated Queen meant that the Colony could at long last produce new drones. Inferno didn't know why everyone reacted as if it was a bad thing.

Anyway, the reason for Inferno's confusion was that during the first night in the Queen's recharge bed, she had produced a long, thin, impressively sized organ. The ant knew enough basic physiology to know that this particular organ was pretty much exclusive to males, meaning…   

"Megatron to Inferno!"

The voice that sounded (to Inferno, at least) like a choir of heavenly angels singing a mighty ant war anthem brought Inferno out of his current line of thought. He eagerly tapped the 'respond' button on his com-link.

"Yes, Royalty!"

"Waspinator and Terrorsaur haven't turned up for their morning shifts. I want you, Vice Grip and Insecticon to find them and bring them to the throne room for punishment."

Inferno frowned. "But Royalty, I thought that was reserved for me?"

"Not that kind of punishment you fool!" Megatron yelled. "Just bring them to me, on the double!"

"As you command, Queenie-buns!"

"And stop calling me that over the coms!"

*****

"Would you please let us go!"

Blackarachnia looked up from her hand held game at Terrorsaur, who at this moment was wrapped in a web cocoon suspended from the ceiling over a pit of lava. Beside him was Waspinator, in a similar state.

"You know the deal", the spider replied. "You tell me how you found out about…that incident…and I don't give you a fiery death."

"But we can't!" Waspinator buzzed. "Wazzzzpinator not want to anger…"

Waspinator trailed off as Blackarachnia's gaze swiveled onto him.

"Anger who?"

"For the last time, we can't tell you! He'd murder us!" Terrorsaur yelled.

"Okay then," Blackarachnia muttered, transforming to Beast Mode and leaping to the ceiling near the web threads preventing her comrades from taking a swim in the lava. "Give my regards to the Pit Keeper."

"NOOOOOOO!" the duo screamed simultaneously. "It was Tarantulas!"

At the sound of the other spider's name, all eight of Blackarachnia's eyes narrowed in fury. 

"Taran…tulas?" She repeated, her voice far too calm to actually _be _calm.

"Yeah! Wazzzzpinator and Needlenose in Big Bang Sex Shop this morning…"

"WASPY!" Terrorsaur screamed in embarrassment.

"…when spider-bot come in with tape to copy and sell. Shop owner played tape for quality. Wazzzzzzpinator think quality VERY good."

Blackarachnia couldn't believe what she was hearing. "Are…are you telling me that Tarantulas somehow managed to tape…that incident…had it copied, then sold it in a sex shop?!?"

"Uh…yes."

A thought occurred to Blackarachnia. "Do…you guys have copies?"

Terrorsaur and Waspinator shared a guilty look. "No."

With a small growl, Blackarachnia reached for Terrorsaur's cord.

"Okay! Yes, we do!" Terrorsaur cried. "We even have three back-ups in case we loose the originals!"

The black widow stared at the pterodactyl for a second before burying her face in two of her legs.

"This is not happening. This is NOT happening."

"What big deal?" Waspinator asked curiously. "So spider-bot gay. No biggie."

Almost instantaneously, Blackarachnia got in the wasp's face, anger apparent on her face.

"Get it through your rheanmium-thick skull, bug boy. I AM NOT GAY!!!"

"If spider-bot say so."

"I'm not! I'm as straight as…"

"A bent pole?" Terrorsaur offered.

"Yes, as straight as a…NO! Dammit!"

Annoyed beyond belief, Blackarachnia leaped to the ledge, transforming back to robot mode as she went. Muttering to herself about how Tarantulas would pay, she left the cavern beneath the Darkside. Waspinator and Terrorsaur watched her go in silence.

"Spider-bot a dead man."

"Mmm-hmm."

*****

Meanwhile, not far from the Darkside, a long forgotten stasis pod's scanners activated, searching for a life form to reformat its occupant into. Said occupant's original spark had long since been extinguished, but now the protoform carried a spark that was the very definition of evil and treachery. A spark that had a score to settle with the Maximals and Predacons. It had taken him a while to return to this particular area of time and space, and even longer to find a protoform with which to mould into a brand new body for himself, but at last everything was coming together. Revenge would soon be his.

"Scanning complete." 

With a hiss, the pod opened, releasing a red, blue and white vulture from within. He had a look at his new body using the reflective metal of the pod.

"Hmmm…I guess this'll do. Let's see how my robot mode turned out. Starscream, TERRORIZE!"

Complying with the spoken command, the ex-Seeker's body shifted to its robot mode. The vulture head took position on his chest, his wings folded onto his back and his vulture legs mounted themselves on a shoulder each as the requisite head, arms and legs also emerged. When it was finished, Starscream was pleased to note that his new robot body was a decent copy of his original, stunningly handsome (if he did say so himself) one. It even had null rays! He cackled loudly in his traditionally high-pitched voice.

"YES! Watch out, Megatron, Primal and the rest of you Animal Cracker rejects! I'm coming for you! BWAHAHAHAHAHAA…"

Just then, Starscream felt a hand come down on his shoulder.

"EEEK!"

To be continued…  


End file.
